The Ogun state police have arrested a 28-year-old woman, Anuoluwapo Joshua, for allegedly stealing a three-year-old girl at the Redemption Camp off the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway.
The Nation reports that Joshua was arrested on December 29th after Akamaka Francis was seen during the church’s end of year children’s party. Joshua allegedly stole the child from her mother in July at the church’s monthly Holy Ghost Congress.
According to the police, the mother had left the little girl and went to the church’s new auditorium to pack their belongings however when she returned, she couldn’t find her child and she immediately alerted the church’s security.
Abimbola Oyeyemi, the command’s spokesman said:
”All efforts to find the child failed. The suspect ran out of luck on Friday December 29th when the child was sighted inside the youth centre at the Redemption Camp during the children’s end of year party.
On receiving the information, the DPO, Redeemed Division, Olaiya Martins, a Superintendent of Police (SP), led detectives to the centre where they waited until the end of the programme.
The suspect came out to pick the child and was promptly arrested after which She confessed to the crime.
She admitted that she lured the child out of her parents’ sight and took her to Ofada, where she has been caring for her.
Investigation further revealed that the suspect had earlier got pregnant for somebody in Lagos but travelled to the North where she claimed she was delivered of a baby girl but when she came back from the North, she didn’t come with the baby.
This made the man who impregnated her to pressure her to bring his child for him.
She later informed her relatives that she was going to Nasarawa State to bring the child but went to Redemption Camp, stayed for some days before stealing the child who she presented her to her relatives as her daughter.
The Commissioner of Police (CP), Ahmed Iliyasu, has ordered the immediate transfer of the suspect to the Criminal Investigation and Intelligence Department for further investigation and prosecution.”
